Staff Software Engineer

Staff Software Engineer Newark, United States At Moody's, we unite the brightest minds to turn today’s risks into tomorrow’s opportunities. We do this by striving to create an inclusive environment where everyone feels welcome to be who they are—with the freedom to exchange ideas, think innovatively, and listen to each other and customers in meaningful ways. Moody’s is transforming how the world sees risk. As a global leader in ratings and integrated risk assessment, we’re advancing AI to move from insight to action—enabling intelligence that not only understands complexity but responds to it. We decode risk to unlock opportunity, helping our clients navigate uncertainty with clarity, speed, and confidence. If you are excited about this opportunity but do not meet every single requirement, please apply! You still may be a great fit for this role or other open roles. We are seeking candidates who model our values: invest in every relationship, lead with curiosity, champion diverse perspectives, turn inputs into actions, and uphold trust through integrity. Skills and Competencies 8+ years in software and data platform engineering, owning a technical domain across multiple teams Deep SQL Server expertise and administration: internals, performance at scale, high availability and disaster recovery architecture, and capacity planning, including experience as the final escalation point for SQL Server problems SQL Server on Linux and Kubernetes: has designed, not only operated, stateful data-intensive workloads on Kubernetes using StatefulSets, persistent volumes, and pod quality of service Deep AWS experience across Elastic Kubernetes Service, Elastic Compute Cloud, Elastic Block Store, Simple Storage Service, Identity and Access Management, and networking, with the ability to reason about cost and reliability together Lakehouse architecture experience: Apache Iceberg or Delta Lake in production, catalog strategy (AWS Glue, S3 Tables, Polaris, Unity), compaction, and table maintenance Replication and change data capture architecture at scale, including failure and recovery modes; estate-wide operational standards covering configuration baselines, patch and cumulative update strategy, and integrity and maintenance regimes Database security and compliance architecture: encryption, access control, auditing, and key management; architectural influence without authority through request for comment documents or standards adopted beyond own team Strong backend engineering in C#/.NET with the ability to write and review production code; excellent written communication for a distributed engineering team Preferred: backup, disaster recovery, and storage architecture on AWS including tested cross-region recovery; streaming and integration at platform scale using Kafka, Debezium, AWS Database Migration Service, and Spark; infrastructure as code and GitOps at platform scale; data lifecycle management including partitioning, archival, and retention for very large databases; working knowledge of Java Deep expertise in artificial intelligence, with a track record of implementing advanced AI solutions to drive strategic transformation and operational efficiency. Strong experience using AI tools to lead innovation initiatives. Demonstrated leadership in managing AI-related risks, ensuring ethical governance, and fostering a culture of responsible AI adoption across the organization Education Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related discipline, or equivalent professional experience Responsibilities Set the technical direction and long-term roadmap for Moody's Insurance Solutions data platform, driving architecture standards and reliability across engineering teams. Own the reference architecture: topology, high availability and disaster recovery design, storage layout, tenancy, version strategy, and patch strategy Define the availability contract — the recovery point objective and recovery time objective the platform commits to — and lead the drills that prove it Own the build-versus-buy position against managed alternatives, including licensing economics, and set the operational standard through configuration baselines, drift control, and integrity and maintenance regimes Own the security and compliance posture, providing the evidence required for internal and regulatory review Architect how change flows from SQL Server into the lakehouse with defined latency, ordering, and schema-evolution guarantees; own the lakehouse integration strategy covering table formats, catalog choice and federation, partitioning, and compaction Set the 12 to 24 month platform roadmap, sequenced against business priorities with risks identified, and establish the paved road through deployment patterns, schema change management, observability baselines, runbooks, and cost guardrails Mentor and sponsor engineers, lead the most complex problems including during incidents, and represent the platform in architecture forums and to engineering leadership About the Team The Data Platform Team builds and operates the foundational data services, infrastructure, and tooling that power Moody's Insurance Solutions products, including a self-hosted Microsoft SQL Server estate running on Linux and Kubernetes in AWS. The team owns that platform end to end — availability, performance, recoverability, and cost — and partners closely with product engineering teams to enable scalable growth and long-term platform modernization. By joining our team, you will shape the architecture of a mission-critical platform and help drive the responsible adoption of modern data and AI technologies across the organization. For US-based roles only: the anticipated hiring base salary range for this position is $168,100.00 - $243,700.00, depending on factors such as experience, education, level, skills, and location. This range is based on a full-time position. In addition to base salary, this role is eligible for incentive compensation. Moody’s also offers a competitive benefits package, including not but limited to medical, dental, vision, parental leave, paid time off, a 401(k) plan with employee and company contribution opportunities, life, disability, and accident insurance, a discounted employee stock purchase plan, and tuition reimbursement. Moody’s is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, sex, gender, age, religion or creed, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, marital or familial status, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, genetic information, physical or mental disability, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Moody’s also provides reasonable accommodation to qualified individuals with disabilities or based on a sincerely held religious belief in accordance with applicable laws. If you need to inquire about a reasonable accommodation, or need assistance with completing the application process, please email View email address on click.appcast.io. This contact information is for accommodation requests only, and cannot be used to inquire about the status of applications. For San Francisco positions, qualified applicants with criminal histories will be considered for employment consistent with the requirements of the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance. This position may be considered a promotional opportunity, pursuant to the Colorado Equal Pay for Equal Work Act. Candidates for Moody's Corporation may be asked to disclose securities holdings pursuant to Moody’s Policy for Securities Trading and the requirements of the position. Employment is contingent upon compliance with the Policy, including remediation of positions in those holdings as necessary. #J-18808-Ljbffr